On-Net Building List

May 18, 2009

Does anyone know why companies like Level3/Yipes/Abovenet/Global Crossing don't make their on-net building list available readily? Cogent/Zayo/etc have it listed right on their website....Zayo even gives you this downloadable KMZ file for Google Earth.

I'm working with a few clients who run their own data center/web hosting facilities and are looking at new spaces in various Class A office buildings. Obviously, I can go around and call all the providers, but it becomes a voicemail game.

I've been running a niche hosting business (one man show) for about 6 months now and so far I've learnt the basics of the hosting business. In fact I'm quite successful too, with good profits right from the first month. I know a bit of server admin and manage my own servers.

However, now I plan to start general shared hosting business and have decided to own my hardware and colocate it at a DC. (I'm not located in the US; the DC owner is my friend and would receive the hardware and set it up for me.)

The box would cater to general shared webhosting needs with cPanel (I don't like it but the market does )

I am thinking about buying this processor and building a server with it. This processor is very affordable for me but I am wondering what kind of server I should run it as? Do you think the processor would be able to handle a heavy DDoS attack and act as a good firewall?

I am working on building another hosting companies which I will be hosting VPSs as well.

I am asking this from a customers opion.

with each plan should it be an = shared amount of the processor or should each person have a dedicated amount? For example say you got duel quadcore processors running 3ghz which would = like 24ghz total correct? Say you have 16 VPS on 1 server each getting roughly 1.5Ghz.

We currently have a few racks within a UK Datacentre and unfortunately its filling up quicker and quicker by the day.

When we contacted our account manager during the week for another rack we were told that there is less than 5 racks left. Saying that these new racks came with +20% increase on our normal costs plus a Ł800 setup fee. While I have no complaints with the price going up for the rack (as its the same in any data centre when it gets full) I am starting to think that if we (as a company) maybe benefit more to converting an office into a data suite and getting suitable fibre to the building.

One reason why I am calling this a data suite and not a data centre is it wont have the benefits of a backup generator and fire suppression system as costs would outway the benefits (at the moment anyway). We are looking to only have around 4/8 racks in this data suite with none of the services being hosted business critical.

At the moment our current DC is around 100 miles from me so when we looked at the location we found that having one closer to our office and my home allot easier/beneficial. Next option was is there affordable fibre access available and yes there is. There was many sets of offices and industrial sites which already had fibre access to the doors with many suppliers available such as the national fibre grid (BT), Virgin Media Backhaul and Global Crossing (waiting to be confirmed on GC to see if its theirs or BTs). Least that saves the cost of the expensive last miles from the POP.

Either way the fibre we would be using would be used to back haul our connection to a London DC to plug into our network. Over the last week I have been looking at possible locations, costs, quotes etc to see what I can work with. I am just wondering if anyone else has done something similar (as in setting up a few racks away from the DC) and how did it turn out?

One worry I did worry about is losing the data centres remote hands when things go really wrong and say a technician is unavailable to go to the suite. All our servers are hooked up to KVMs and Reboot racks so if something does go wrong (software wise) we can cope but the thought does linger over me slightly.

I want to build a top of the line SeedBox that can handle 100 users. I need help on what kind of software and hardware I need with prices. I want this to be able to hold a 10Gbits line. (Or 10 1Gbits lines) And security stuff I need like firewall or virus scanner stuff. And Back-Up type stuff like in case of a HD Crash. And how to get 100 different IP addresses.

I am planing on building a small data center either in Waterloo, Ontario or in the surrounding area of Toronto, Ontario.

My questions:

1.) Is Waterloo a good area to build a data center? I know its a technology area but I havent seen much data centers from the area. And are there any bandwidth providers in the area?

2.) Anyone know a good place in the surrounding area of Toronto ontario where fiber lines will be easy to bring in? Mostly looking for something on the edge of the city, planing of purchasing my own land and a place where it will be easy to expand. Right now looking Bolton area or Brampton

3.) What bandwidth providers can be found in these areas? Need someone who can offer bandwidth for cheap like the do in the states so I can offer my customers cheap bandwidth also.

4.) If I open a data center in Waterloo ontario do you guys think there will be a good demand for colocation there?

So I need to build or buy a server to run my site. The site will use a basic LAMP setup and we will also be allowing for file uploads and downloads. File sizes aren't expected to be too large, mostly word/PDF documents and maybe some Powerpoint presentations. At the moment we can only afford one box to run the whole site so we need to build something that can handle both file serving and basic site stuff.

I'm wondering what kinds of hardware we would need to make this happen. If I were to setup a box with a quad core CPU, 4-8GB of RAM, and a few 15K RPM drives would that be able to handle file serving and PHP/mySQL? Would multiple processors be required? What about RAID?

I guess the real question is what kind of hardware requirements are involved with setting up a file server. I'm guessing running PHP and mySQL is not really an issue but I don't want the site to slow down because of the file serving. I'm sure some of you have experience with this sort of thing so if anyone knows please let share your thoughts.

Wondering what the most cost-effective and efficient way of building up a bulk backup server. I'm colocating some equipment and will have a private network.

I have a full cab, and only a few servers in it, so lots of room to spare.

Now this will originally just be used for my own users, but I need ease-of-use and expandability. For example, I can load it up with lots of cheap SATA drives, and a raid card. However, what do I actually do on the software end? Installing Linux and setting up rsync crons is the easy part, but what about permissions? Is there an easy way to create users?

Lets say you're building your 'perfect' rack or cabinet, you've got a single network and power drop from your provider, 20 x mixed 1 and 2u boxes (two interfaces per box), 1u switch and require remote reboot across them all. No other servers to go in the rack at a later date.

What are you gonna buy if budget wasn't an issue? rack/cab/pdu/cbl management/etc/etc.

In me effort to go colo I have been studying as best I can different server builds. Here is some information you may want to know or be able to help me and others with.

Quest: Build a server designed for serving html and other uses as a webserver (mail, database, etc). Limux operating System

Chipset- Although I found a lot of good and bad motherboards, I could find no information regarding chipsets and Linux. maybe it does not matter, who knows? Also..upgrading motherboard and chipset AFTER server is up and running seems like a challenge.

Harddrives- It would seem best to get a harddrive made for a 24/7 uptime. Not ALL drives are like this. Seemingly, unconfirmed, SCSI drives are for this pupose. However, Western Digital has made some 'RE' drives that are to be up 24/7 with no issues.Note: 7200+ rpm drives appear to fail more often and some suggest a more stable 5400rpm.

Built in NIC vs Adding one- Very little could be found on this, but would assume a much better one should be bought and not use an onboard one. Some onboards can have probelm with some linux distros too. I would buy one and add it...a good one.

CPU- very little talk was available on linux's use of multiple CPUs. Very little talk was available on speed and use of multiple versus single cpu units. Example- how would a single cpu of 3ghz do against 2 CPUs of 1.8ghz.Having two CPUs does allow for a server to utilize different CPUs for different processes, so if one is busy, the other can be used.No information was really available on the difference..or what you should buy for the actual CPUs.

RAM- Buttloads of ram out there. No info on what works best with linux, which works best for a server, or what kind would work best for a server.

Motherboard- many are available and many suggest different kinds, but no definitive reasons have been given. No idea which would be best for a linux web server.

Control panel versus no control panel - after a little learning curve it would appear a non control panel is easy to use for a single user server. Control panels are buggy, have many issues, but do allow multi user systems and shared servers to be easily used. Some seem very limited in the updated versions of software. I will be going with fedora, but no control panel. The overhead is not something I want to deal with..or the bugs, or the old software, of the issues of upgrading. Ensim and cpanel seem most used and professionally serviced.

Raid- Just working on this one. No real info as to the best type of raid card for a linux webserver. Raid 1 is a mirror system i believe that allows you to have two drives where one is a ghost of another (sort of)? Do not know how much this slows the system or the drives down, but a mirror would be best in the case of a failure.Do not know what happens when there is a failure (will system freeze, ignore it, hang?)

Partition of drives: It would seem that putting the linux system on one aprtition, the /home directory on another, and perhaps the mail directory on another is a way to make it easier to deal with certain issues. If you need to compile, reinstall, or whatever with linux and all your data is not on the partition, it becomes easier. If a partition gets screwed, the data is spread out, so much can not be destroyed. The actual amounts for the partitions are not evident in my research.

ANyway, that is a synopsis of info I have been perusing these last few days. Usually you can only find someone talking about something they use and like, but no real details to balance out why something else will not be as good.

One other note: Distros of llinux are all over the place. But for a webserver I do not think any distro is really needed. Perhaps just building your own kernel would be good (and a great learning experience)...but that remains to be seen.

I will be posting a web page in the coming weeks with a detail of how I built, where i bought, and how I installed, my new server here.

I need to build a video server that supports remote inbound live streams (multiple sources) and multiple outbound streams. I'm interested in hearing feedback or suggestions on Real Media Server, Microsoft Media Server, or other alternatives. Please share your thoughts on any of these. I would prefer Linux hosting and would prefer Windows Media formats. I would love to hear what some of you have had successes with.

We're building a bunch of new servers (as I mentioned in another thread). What do you guys think is the best drive layout? Traditionally we just have the entire 4-6 drives in a RAID 5, but now I'm wondering if it makes sense to have a separate OS drive, and then the rest in a raid 5?

On a side note, we need a giant ~2TB-3TB partition on these boxes, that's why we go with the multi-drive raid setup. Thoughts? I know it was customary to have a separate OS drive back in the day (I remember having WD raptor's for that), but now when the WD Black-edition (which we'll be using for the raid setup) are as fast as the raptor's, is it even worth it?

I have done my research, befriend a few super proxy webmasters, and learned everything I need to know about being successful in the proxy business. So I am selling almost all my websites to fund this huge project. I will also be flipping proxies from time to time to fund the project even more. This will be a year long project and will be my full time job sooner or later. My goal is to have 1,000 proxy sites.

I currently dev locally on a cobalt RAQ (ollld!) and would like to upgrade this setup.

I'm looking for a simple way of getting a linux system setup for internal dev work with the basics... mysql, apache, php5, and some kind of version control - subversion / cvs.

Are there any linux liveCDs that I could use to make something like this quite easily?For our production server we use plesk, so a control panel similar to that for setting up new dev domains would be useful. Open source of couse tho.

to build two 1u rackmount servers, and colocate them to a UK datacentre. Nothing uber spec, just need uber redundancy. One box will be Linux (CentOS or Arch), and the other will be Windows 2003.

They will be webservers, with DNS, MySQL, SMTP and POP3/IMAP services.

Having trawled through google, and loads of junk and seriously out of date websites, I am still no further in my research to find a decent hardware manufacturer, and a UK source to buy the hardware from.

I have seen a few good pages, but there is never any prices on these sites.

BTW. I want to avoid DELL completely, I have had so many problems with Dell before, and if something goes wrong they won't sell you the part to fix it, and charge insane amounts to fix it. Also their configurators are a con, they give you a basic setup to start with for quite cheap - and if you upgrade it you pay the more than the retail amount for the upgraded part and you don't get the part you are replacing it with that you have already paid for in the base price.

Either way, looking to buy the components separately, so the can be upgraded/replaced easily.

For both servers I am looking for:- redundant hotswappable PSUs, preferably front access, but with power into the back (2)- redundant nic- hardware RAID controller (mirror or raid5)- hotswappable drives (2+)- dualcore cpu- hardware for serial terminal access (remote access incase system does not boot, or has a problem booting into the OS)

This thread is dedicated to those who find themselves on or considering this path.

Here, I am not hosting any ‘foreign business interests’ or associating with any other ‘hostile networks’. I am needing to create many sub-nets, with 3 to 5 WAN’s inbound and outbound. I have a ‘research sub-net’ needing special considerations and will link associates/contractors by VPN. The product-line will also require Radius Server(s). Plus more details and requirements that make the whole project most complicated.

(Thanks to ‘leeware’ for this beginning theme)

1.0 Objective: Building a 30-50 Server facility:

I checked my records and made this decision 2 - ˝ months ago. Since then I have acquired 28 servers, an internet security device, two 3com’s, two 4-port kvm’s, a few small Cisco switches and a host of power related stuff.

2.0 Justification for Building vs leasing:

Control. Costs. Open options. Unique demands more easily appreciated by myself as I am the one possessing the vision. Choosing who I work with as I do the hiring/contracting or initiate associations.

We are generally molded by personal experiences and these set-up our prejudices. I am certainly no exception. My experiences with hosts generated an excellent introduction to the wide world of websites/control panels etc and some products that support it. But the too often cryptic communications, some surprise costs due to my ignorance and that vulnerable ‘boxed in’ feeling made me wonder…

2.1 What is your rational for building vs leasing?

One of my major ‘cross the line’ rational came when I discovered I could buy a used server each month for a similar cost of leasing one. Next, were all my own confounded ‘special circumstances’ that kept cropping up and of course these were not the fault of any hosting company. Lastly technology came to my street in the form of good multiple pipes and my zoning is acceptable because I am off a major highway.

3.0 Business Objectives:

My business objectives center around a very long-run project that I have already long ago completed and keep updated to viability. And I would rather keep that subject to another venue.

4.0 Budgetary Information:

I have enough ‘resources’ to pull it off.

4.2 What is your operating budget (How much money do you plan to spend on an ongoing basis to keep the place running for 12-24 months?)

Same as previous and I will note that ‘time and attention’ is keenly important.

4.3 More importantly, where is this money going to come from? If from investors they generally require a sound business plan.

I require a sound business plan and have it.

5.0 Return on Investment:

Accomplish goals on and on…

5.1 After you account for the initial capital expense to get everything up and running + your on going operating costs, how long will it take you to make back your initial investment and then reach profitability? (12/24/36 months for longer?)

We have a small web+email hosting and data center business in Africa. We've been providing hosting services to our clients using Plesk on Dell-based servers (connected over a Fiberchannel interface to a SAN). Our data center is connected via an STM-4 and multiple STM-1s to 2 different upstream providers.

The problem we're having is (as a result of our own lack of knowledge) that our solution is just not scalable in the current configuration. We essentially buy a Dell server, install Plesk and keep provisioning customer domains (web and mail hosting) on it till capacity runs out (we max out on average at 400 domains per server) and then buy the next Dell machine and repeat.

What we're looking for is advice on building a more scalable and automated solution. Essentially we're looking for a software and hardware solution (blade solution with web and mail software that is able to harness the power / redundancy of multiple blade servers) that enables us to provision thousands of customers at one go (and simply add more blades servers as needed).

I'm building a storage server out of spare parts that are lying around here at the office. Purchasing a brandnew server kinda overshoots it's target, since all basic hardware is available lika a big Chieftec 4U casing with 2x 4drive SATA hotswap bays.

The machine will just be dumb storage for saving our backups.

The plan is to add a decent serverboard, proc and some ram as a baseline. On top of that a 3ware 8-port RAID-controller with 8 1TB harddrives (seagate has some nice ones).

Now the only issue i'm having is powerconsumption. The case has an 460W PSU, but I'm not sure if that's enough.

We are going to offer web space to our students and we want to build a new server just for this purpose. We were looking at buying a storage array, a RAID card, and a server. I have no problems building a server; however, I have never built anything with an external enclosure. I am thinking about buying this storage array:

www newegg com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816702010

I plan on installing hard drives in every drive bay for a total of 12 drives.

The problem I'm having is I don't know what type of RAID card to buy. I saw this one; but, I don't know if it will work with this storage array.

www newegg com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816116062

Thanks so much for any light you can shed on this! I apologize for the link but I do not have enough posts insert URLs.

I would like to thank in advance to anyone who shares his knowledge or experience here.

I am trying to find a firewall with some routing capability. Since I expect to have Gbps transfer in the near future, I don't think I can find a solid commercial hardware firewall within my low budget. That's why I am looking at software products.

I would need firewall functions(ability to prevent DDoS attacks is desirable) and basic routing functions (dynamic routing and BGP is desirable but not necessary at the moment).

I have an issue with Plesk and Awstats not building the html pages for website statistics. Problem is server-wide i.e. it effects all domains.

I've tried to manually run the /usr/local/psa/admin/sbin/statistics with every possible options but all that happens is that awstats calculates new stats to the vhosts /var/www/vhosts/system/domain.tld/statistics/webstat/awstatsMMYYYY.domain.tld-http.txt file.

Nothing is put into the /var/www/vhosts/system/domain.tld/statistics/webstat/YYYY-MM folder which should contain the static html pages.

So things I have already checked: - Awstat paths in /etc/psa/psa.conf are correct - Domain configs are ok as awstat can create the stats data and awstats_buildstaticpages.pl can can create the pages just fine - File permissions are ok

I just cannot figure what the problem is. /usr/local/psa/admin/sbin/statistics doesn't give any errors but on the other hand it doesn't have a debug option either which might be useful.

one of my client have an in-house subscriber list with 30000 email build with their offline promotional campaign. They need to send 4 to 5 email in a month and the list might expand to 60000 in a year.

they are using a mailing program to schedule the mailing at 250 email per hour as according to the limit of their ISP and they are looking for a better solution.

i want to suggest them taking a VPS but i'm new to VPS so i'm here to looking for suggestion that i can recommend to my client.